By Matthew Russell Lee
www.innercitypress.com/unsc1bfdec120209.html
UNITED NATIONS, December 2 -- The agenda of the UN Security Council was discussed informally on the night of December 1, then formally the next day. At a fried rice and liquor stoked reception by Thailand on Tuesday night, a diplomat from Georgia asked Inner City Press if his country, following the war with Russia and the subsequent removal of UN observers, is still on the Council's agenda.
Meanwhile, as Venezuela's Ambassador fueled up, Inner City Press asked if he expects his country's letter to the Council to succeed in its request to put Colombia on the Council's agenda. Let's see, the Ambassador said.
Which member would call for a vote on Venezuela's request, Inner City Press asked. Already it appears that neither Mexico nor Costa Rica will do so. We have friends on the Council, Venezuela's Ambassador said. But the one other logical friend -- part of the axis including Hugo, as one wag put it -- said that the conflict between Colombia and Venezuela isn't serious enough to get on the agenda.
Wednesday the new President of the Council, Burkina Faso's Michel Kafando, took question about the Council's program of work for December. Inner City Press asked four questions, including what happened with Venezuela's letter, since the issue is not even in the footnotes of the month's calendar.
"Yes we were seized by Venezuela," Ambassador Kafando began. "But the Council prefers to have all the necessary elements at hand before expressing itself" or even taking a matter up in its program of work. What further information could the Council be waiting for? Or is this just a diplomatic way to say, not enough deaths?
Inner City Press asked if the Council will discuss Iraq, where the election is being postponed, and if Georgia is still on the Council's agenda. Video here, from Minute 23:38. Ambassador Kafando said there is no Council meeting on that Iraq topic -- a Western member on the other hand tells Inner City Press there are consultations on December 4.
Kafando said that Georgia was not raised by anybody, and therefore isn't in the program of work. But it is "still a current question" he said, "we might discuss it."
The distinction is between being in the program of work, and being "on the agenda," so it can be raised. Sri Lanka, despite tens of thousands of victims, was never placed on the agenda, and is no longer discusssed by the Council, even in the basement. But Georgia can be.
Inner City Press asked when the Council will finally consider the very damning Group of Experts report on the Congo, which slams MONUC for assisting Congolese Army units which kill and assist illegal mining. Kafando said there is a meeting on the 16th of December, but he is not sure if the report, already widely publicly available, will be "ready" at that time. "There is a problem with that," he said, "the report hasn't been finalized."
The Group of Experts leaked the report because they fear that the process in New York of "finalizing" it would result in its being watered down. Now the Council refuses to consider the report UNTIL it has been watered down. Only at the UN.
